


The Squatter's Approval

by Kiranokira



Series: Shenanigans from the 2017–18 Figure Skating Season [2]
Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Background Relationships, Established Relationship, F/F, Fluff and Humor, Mild Smut, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-31
Updated: 2017-10-31
Packaged: 2019-01-27 07:50:11
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,878
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12577116
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kiranokira/pseuds/Kiranokira
Summary: “He’s like a fucking squatter in your relationship,” Yuri says.“Language,” Yakov grumbles, already tucked under a blanket and shielded by a face mask. “But if he’s talking about Crispino, he’s right.”“If you two ever move in together, you’re gonna have to build him a shack in the backyard,” Yuri says.This is what gives Mila her grand idea.





	The Squatter's Approval

**Author's Note:**

> This is technically post-2018 Olympics, but it's part of the same timeline as [Feathers on the Ice](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11854272), the upcoming Viktor/Yuuri fic I haven't posted yet, and whatever other fics I come up with for this 'verse. \:D/
> 
> (Spoilers for My Fair Lady and West Side Story.)

Their post-podium hug in Pyeongchang lasts so long that Mila’s gold medal and Sara’s bronze grow warm between them.

At the airport the following day, Yuri calls out to her across the business class lounge, “Thanks for the laugh!” The photo he sends her shows Michele standing several meters behind Sara and Mila with his face frozen in a deeply unflattering purple tableau of suppressed turmoil.

Mila sighs, sends the photo to Sara, and writes, [At least he wasn’t crying this time?]

Sara sends back a gif of Yuri pulling one of his resting revolted faces at his last press conference. Then, a moment later, [Miiiickeeeyyy… I’ll talk to him. Again.]

[I’d leave him alone,] Mila writes. [He might just want the attention.]

Sara sends back a deadpan emoji. [He DOES want the attention. But he’s acting like a baby and I’m not putting up with it anymore!!]

Mila considers a few different responses, wondering if she should keep trying to encourage peace between the siblings, but she knows she ultimately sides with Sara on this. She isn’t a capable enough liar to play mediator for them, either.

It’s been nearly a year since she started dating Sara, and Michele seems no more comfortable with his sister’s relationship than he was when Sara first broke the news to him at Worlds. He spent the first three months confident that the relationship would fizzle, the next five months pretending it didn’t exist, and the most recent three months in paradoxical paroxysms of fury and misery.

The closest Michele has come to approval was his assessment in December that Mila is “better than Seung-gil”.

Mila’s still tempted to tell Phichit just to see what he’d do; he’s surprisingly protective of his boyfriend.

As she boards her flight with the rest of her team, Mila records herself blowing a kiss and sends it to Sara. Her seatbelt is barely buckled when Sara sends back a snapshot of Mila’s winking face with a pink kiss mark drawn on her cheek. There’s also a tiny cartoon Michele under a raincloud in the corner of the screenshot, his mouth a sharp triangular frown and his eyes shooting green lasers.

Yuri peers over her shoulder and snickers. “He’s like a fucking squatter in your relationship,” he says.

“ _Language_ ,” Yakov grumbles, already tucked under a blanket and shielded by a face mask. “But if he’s talking about Crispino, he’s right.”

“If you two ever move in together, you’re gonna have to build him a shack in the backyard,” Yuri says.

This is what gives Mila her grand idea.

•

As training winds down a week later, Mila stops in front of Yuuri on the center of the ice.

“Hey,” she says in English. “Do you have a second?”

Yuuri says, “Of course, sure,” because he’s a sweetheart.

Mila starts on a lazy lap around the perimeter and Yuuri follows at her side.

“So, Sara’s coming to visit after Worlds,” she tells him. “And I told her she could stay with me.”

He makes the _eh_ noise that seems to be the Japanese version of both _wow!_ and _mm-hm_. From anyone else, it would probably grate on her that she can’t always tell which one it sounds more like, but from Yuuri it’s always adorable.

“Right. But Michele…”

“Ah,” Yuuri says.

“Yeah. He still doesn’t like that Sara’s dating.”

Yuuri switches to skating backward, but he still doesn’t look directly at her. She can’t tell if it’s a cultural thing or a Yuuri thing, even after sharing a rink for a year. “What are you going to do?” he asks.

“I have a plan,” she says, winking.

That, she’s pleased to note, actually draws Yuuri’s full focus to her.

“I’m inviting _him_ , too.”

•

“No.”

Mila pouts. “Sara!” Her practice session telling Yuuri went much farther than this before he presented his doubts.

Sara peers up from her notebook, one eyebrow lifted.

Of course, in retrospect, this was probably one of the worst times for Mila to bring it up. Sara’s hair is still curled from her commercial filming, framing her face in soft dark waves, and her face is glowing from the complex facial treatment she just gave herself. She’s _also_ dressed in a pale yellow camisole and her softest pink flannel boxers for bed, and both her dark, bare legs are crossed at the ankles on her desk. There’s even a bare strip of stomach showing, because the universe is unjust.

Mila never feels so utterly out of her depth with her girlfriend than when she’s violently confronted with how gorgeous and effortlessly sexy she is.

Even worse, Mila’s _admitted_ this to her before, so Sara knows exactly how much power she has right now.

“I’m not bringing my brother to Russia,” Sara says. Both her expression and her tone of voice have more scorn than Mila thinks is necessary.

“He’s going to be part of your life forever,” Mila says, trying not to whine. “And I’m tired of him glaring at me and hating me.”

“I talked to him about that,” Sara says. She highlights something in her notebook and then turns it to face her laptop camera. “Look, I made an itinerary!”

Mila can’t tamp down a smile when she takes in the various colors for sightseeing categories and the neatly printed Russian letters at the top representing Mila’s name and address. “That’s really cute,” she says. Her girlfriend is precious. Damn it.

“He said he’d leave us alone forever,” Sara says. She rolls her eyes and puts her notebook on the desk. “So we’re not speaking anyway.”

“But that’s a problem!”

“Bringing him to Russia won’t fix it,” Sara says. There’s a note of warning in her voice.

“It might,” Mila argues. “My apartment has a spare bedroom and _you’re_ not going to be in there, so—”

“Mila, no,” Sara says, wrinkling her nose. “He doesn’t like seeing us _hug_. How do you think he’s going to take seeing us go into your bedroom every night?”

“You’re twenty-four! He can’t be this creepy about you forever!”

Mila knows as the words leave her mouth that Sara’s not going to take it well. But she’s been holding in that particular adjective for years, long before they were dating, and even though she’s seen Sara go off on others who use it about her brother, Mila’s not sorry she said it and she doesn’t try to take it back.

She’s not expecting Sara to disconnect the call, though.

Mila groans and drops her head on her forearms. Stupid family drama. She has in-law issues at twenty; how is this fair?

•

As usual after fighting with Sara, Mila calls Ji-na.

Who was asleep.

The first thing Ji-na whines at the screen is both high-pitched and in Korean, then she dons her glasses and sees Mila’s sheepish smile.

“Why?” Ji-na groans, faceplanting into her pillow. Everything is dark, leaving only the light from her phone to illuminate some of her pillow and a sheen off her black hair.

“Don’t leave your phone’s sound on when you’re asleep!” Mila laughs.

“I forgot!” Ji-na moans.

It takes about a minute to exchange excuses and apologies, then Ji-na yawns and sits back against her headboard, holding her phone out in front of her with a sullen look.

“What happened now?”

Mila’s curled up in bed, her phone on its charging dock where she doesn’t have to hold onto it. Her arms are occupied wrapped around the pillow she’s been pretending is her girlfriend for the last several months.

“I called Mickey creepy,” she admits.

Ji-na lets out a peal of delighted laughter and covers her mouth to muffle it, even though her eyes are still creased with mirth.

“I’m at my limit with him,” Mila says.

“Yes,” Ji-na says, once she’s composed herself. She still sounds amused even if she isn’t smiling quite so wide anymore. “But Sara loves him. He’s her beloved twin. He’s always going to be part of her life.”

“That’s what I said!” Mila says with indignant force. “I told her to bring him here in April so he could spend more time with us together! He’s never gotten to know me, so he just sees me as the girlfriend who’s ‘better than Seung-gil’.”

Ji-na laughs again, but affects an apologetic expression when Mila makes an emphatic gesture of impatience.

“If it makes you feel better,” Ji-na says, “I think you’re better than Seung-gil, too.”

“Phichit doesn’t.”

“Phichit doesn’t count. He’s in love.”

“Sara doesn’t.”

Ji-na gives her a flat look. “Don’t start.”

Mila rolls onto her back with a dramatic sigh. “My girlfriend hates me,” she announces to her quiet apartment. “She wants to run away with a Korean sociopath who still doesn’t remember her name.”

“I think he called her Cara last week. He’s getting there.”

Mila turns her head and gives Ji-na a pathetic simper. “What am I going to do?” she pouts.

Ji-na yawns. “You,” she says pointedly, “are gonna watch TV with me until I fall asleep again. And then you’re gonna apologize to your girlfriend. And then you’re gonna learn the time difference between St. Petersburg and Seoul and not call me at one in the morning.”

“That’s a _lot_ of things. The first two sound doable, but that third one—”

“You’re a terrible friend.”

“I love you, Ji-naaaa.”

•

Mila falls asleep hours later curled tight around the pillow and wakes up like a starfish with the pillow on the floor. When she reaches for her phone, it’s with a dark sense of dread that she can’t quite stifle. She tried to make the apology she sent last night heartfelt, but that meant excluding some things like genuine remorse.

Sara’s response sits high among her notifications, but contains none of her usual excited caps.

Groaning, Mila opens the message and begins to read.

[I know you’re not really sorry,] is not a promising start, but Mila soldiers on. [But I also know what you said came from a frustrated place. I’m also frustrated. I know he’s driving you crazy. He’s driving me crazy, too. I don’t think taking him to Russia is a good idea, but I asked him if he wanted to. I expected him to say no, but he accepted. So now I guess you got your way. I hope you’re prepared. :/]

Mila considers this very carefully for all of two minutes, then screencaps it and sends it to her mother along with a brief explanation and a, [Mamaaaa! I won but it doesn’t feel good!]

Her mother writes back, [Your father says thank you for the funny wake up text. Also, this is what commitment feels like. Consider other options. Love, Mama~]

•

Sara’s annoyance fades in the weeks leading up to Worlds, worn down by training, competition, excitement, and Michele behaving himself as much as he seems capable. Since he avoids Mila at the few events they end up at together, Mila hears from Sara that his disapproval has waned from outright lecturing to snippy comments and eye rolls.

“I think he’s happy he’s going too,” Sara says once, when the two of them are falling asleep on different continents, each with her phone on her pillow.

“Nm,” Mila says. She’s keeping her opinions about Michele to herself—at least until he pushes her to her limit again.

Sara makes a quiet noise, close to a laugh, and pokes her camera. “You’ll like him one day,” she says.

Mila smiles into her pillow and wrinkles her nose like she does when Sara pokes her nose in person. She feels fuzzy with exhaustion, but knowing Sara thinks they’ll be together long enough for Mila to grow fond of Michele makes her heart swell.

•

Sara overtakes her at Worlds by a slim margin, and Mila pokes her thigh while the Italian national anthem plays. Sara winks down at her, then tucks a strand of Mila’s hair behind her ear.

Afterward, Mila finds a video of the moment on Twitter and retweets it.

She has to stare for a few seconds when she wakes up in the morning to the notification that Michele liked it.

•

She sends Ji-na a screenshot, but Ji-na isn’t as shocked as Mila is.

[he loves Sara and he said he liked you better than Seung-gil in december. maybe he’s starting to like you out of the negatives?]

[That’s a low bar…]

[at least there’s a bar!!! that means he’s giving you a chance, right?]

[I think I’m going to need a different bar when he’s here.]

[omggg it was your idea to invite him!!!]

[Yeah, but now I’m suspicious he’s only being friendly so he can find out where I live.]

[ohhh that’s possible.]

[JI-NA!!!!!]

•

The day Sara and Michele are due to arrive, Mila wakes up early and panics when she realizes she hasn’t cleaned since Friday, which was…five days ago. Five days of clutter on every surface, dishes growing rank in the sink, cash lying out from the delivery she ordered three nights in a row, takeout boxes flooding the garbage bin—

It takes her two hours of relentless work to make the apartment as pristine as she wanted it to be, and even then it still smells a little like stale curry and she’s sweating and in urgent need of a shower.

She’s just stepping out of the shower when she sees Sara’s message arrive. [We just landed! Looking forward to seeing you, baby~ ♡]

Mila lets out a frenzied string of curses, then forces herself to take deep breaths. The mantra she goes with to calm down is: _Sara matters more._ When she’s convinced herself of this, she dresses, grabs the greeting sign she drew for her guests, and darts out of her apartment in search of a taxi.

Sara’s messages tracking their progress through the airport imply that Michele is dragging his feet, but given the traffic on the way to the airport, Mila can’t feel too annoyed with him for it. [Sorry,] Sara writes for the third time. [He’s in the bathroom again. He said his stomach is bothering him. I gave him mints from the gift shop and told him they’re constipation medicine.]

When Mila explains this latest update to her newly befriended taxi driver, he lets out an actual guffaw.

She only just manages to get to the front of the arrivals crowd before Sara and Michele walk through the doors. By this time, her hair has dried and she’s fairly sure she looks presentable judging by the way Sara smiles when she finds Mila in the sea of faces before her. Michele barely glances up before he immerses himself in his phone again.

With a bright cry, Sara breaks from his side and dashes around the crowd, startling him into dropping his nonchalant act. With Sara running for her, Mila decides not to wait and see how long it lasts and instead fights through the back of the crowd to get to her girl. Mila frees herself just in time to catch Sara, who twines her legs around Mila and laughs when Mila spins her twice so she can hold on longer.

When Mila lets Sara down, she’s prepared to let go, but Sara promptly does away with that plan. In full view of Michele, who looks like he ate a banana stem by mistake, Sara frames Mila’s face and kisses her. A very involved, heavy kiss.

Mila makes a soft noise—more _really?_ than encouragement—and closes her eyes so she doesn’t have to see Michele grinding his teeth.

In all likelihood, the kiss only lasts a few seconds, but it feels interminably longer. Sara ends it with a poke to Mila’s nose, her face soft with joy.

“I missed you,” she says in Italian, and Mila blushes. Normally she wouldn’t mind a display like that—she’s initiated plenty of romantic greetings herself—but knowing Michele is staring at them and only tentatively tolerates her makes this a little uncomfortable.

Still, Mila says, “Me too,” in Italian, wondering if it’ll win her any points with the visiting team.

Michele’s mouth has taken a decidedly unimpressed shape.

“Hi,” he says in English. His face gives Mila a flashback to the first time she called Yuri cute.

“Hi, Michele.” Mila extricates herself from Sara’s arms and starts to fold her slightly crumpled sign.

“Wait!” Sara says, reaching for it. “Let me see?”

Mila hands it over, then steps out of the way of a family and their three strollers. Sara ushers them over to the wall near the exit to remove them from the teeming masses, but Michele shivers as the wind shoves into the building. His light jacket is probably fine for this time of year in Italy, but Russia clings to winter with all her strength.

“Sara, it’s cold,” he says. He looks pointedly at the automatic doors they’re probably keeping open.

Sara ignores him, which sets off a piercing warning bell in Mila’s head. Sara waits a few beats, her eyes moving over the flowing green cursive and the holographic border on the sign, then gives Mila a sweet smile and lifts onto her toes to kiss her cheek. “It was really sweet to make this for us,” she says. Inside the same breath, she aims a sharp, frosty look at her brother. “Right, Mickey?”

He doesn’t show much of an outward reaction, but he does finally say, “Yeah. Thanks,” to Mila’s shoes.

Mila senses her place relative to the bar is dropping.

•

Sara keeps the taxi ride back to Mila’s apartment filled with chatter and holds tight to Mila’s hand. Michele, sitting proud in the passenger seat, has joined their taxi driver in a demonstration of stony, masculine silence.

Mila hates that she can’t fully enjoy her reunion with Sara. She can sense Michele using the time to imagine all the ways he could set fire to Mila’s apartment.

•

To Mila’s great relief, Michele’s finicky about hygiene, so they’ve barely been in the apartment five minutes when he asks Mila stiffly if he can use her shower. She leads him there and hands him a towel, then explains the knobs and faucets to him. She takes his grunts as confirmation that he understands and won’t scald or freeze himself. As she leaves him in the bathroom, she realizes both of them got through that successfully without making eye contact once.

The moment the water starts, Sara crosses the living room and hugs Mila tight, resting her cheek against Mila’s shoulder. “I’m really sorry,” she says, her voice quiet. “He was making me so angry the whole trip here. He wouldn’t stop complaining about every little thing, and he kept telling me this would prove to him that you’re not right for me—”

Mila cradles the back of her head, stones sinking in her stomach. She didn’t expect Michele to arrive with doves and hugs, but she hoped for at least some wiggle room to change his mind.

Sara senses the change in her mood and tugs on her shirt until Mila meets her eyes. “He’s not going to influence me,” she says firmly. “ _I love you._ ”

It’s not the first time she’s said it, but it feels like the first time she’s said it with that much intensity.

Just to be safe, Mila tugs her into her bedroom and closes the door before she dares another kiss.

•

Sara decides for them that their first evening will be spent unwinding. She has a good deal of sightseeing she wants to do—mainly the obscure things she hasn’t already seen on previous trips—but she and Mila usually spend the first day relaxing.

Michele receives this information stoically, wearing tailored pants and a crisp button-down like he expected to go out again immediately.

He disappears while Mila and Sara discuss what to order in for dinner, and when he returns from the guest room, he’s wearing flannel pajama bottoms and a sweater. He takes an awkward seat on Mila’s armchair and stares at the muted television.

Mila tries not to feel enormously aware of Sara’s chin on her shoulder.

•

Of course, even when Sara and Michele are at odds with each other, Sara still knows him better than anyone on Earth. She suggests they watch My Fair Lady, and Mila’s astounded to witness Michele slowly unfurling throughout the course of the film. He even smiles twice, once at a joke Sara makes in Italian when Audrey Hepburn first appears, and later when Eliza shouts, “MOVE YOUR BLOOMIN’ ARSE!" at Dover.

He doesn’t even give them the stink eye when Sara brings a blanket around her and Mila and uses the cover to snuggle into Mila’s side. Mila holds her because she can’t _not_ , and by the intermission, Sara’s fingers are laced between hers and she’s almost completely relaxed.

•

The tension only returns when they all say goodnight. Michele brushes his teeth and washes his face first, and all the while, he seems to be painfully aware that once he goes into the guest room, he’s leaving his sister entirely in Mila’s hands.

He hesitates in the doorway, frown very much back in place, and says, “Good night, Sara,” in Italian. To Mila, he says, “Good night,” in English.

Mila says, “Good night,” with as much cordiality as she can muster.

Sara, probably intentionally, is scrolling through her phone. “Good night, Mickey,” she says in English.

He glares at the ceiling and sighs, almost silently. When he closes the guest room door, Sara peeks over her phone and finally loosens her shoulders. She loops an arm around Mila’s neck and kisses her jaw. “Please can we go to bed?” she asks, and Mila guesses by the heat in her eyes that she doesn’t mean only to sleep.

Mila can’t exactly say no to that—she’s human, after all—but she knows what she’s about to do is akin to slapping a bear with raw meat.

•

Luckily, Sara can be quiet.

Mila, on the other hand, can _not_.

Especially not with Sara’s fingers curling inside her while her inexhaustible tongue moves over her clit.

Mila comes with a moan, biting her forearm.

Sara nuzzles her thigh with a fond noise and kisses the side of her knee. “I’ve been dreaming of that noise for months,” she whispers.

And with a confession like that, Mila can’t be expected to _stop_.

•

She’s very convinced of that, of course, until morning, when she emerges from her bedroom to find Michele already awake and nibbling toast in the armchair he seems to have claimed as his.

There’s a painfully long stretch of silence during which Mila crosses the room to the bathroom trying to pretend she isn’t completely mussed from sex with Michele’s sister. She doesn’t bother with a good morning, and neither does Michele.

In this way, she thinks, closing the bathroom door behind her, at least they’re on the same page.

•

Rain and sleet keep them inside for the second day as well. Sara and Mila venture out once to the supermarket to test if it’s weather they’re willing to sightsee in, but when they arrive back at Mila’s apartment, they make the very firm decision that, no, this is not weather to do _anything_ in.

However, the errant rain that snuck under their umbrella has done fantastic things to Sara’s hair and even slicked her long coat tighter to her body, so Mila gives up on self-control for a while and pulls Sara aside in the lobby to ravish her mouth. Sara shows an equal lack of restraint, setting down her half of the groceries and unbuttoning Mila’s jacket. Sighing against Mila’s tongue, she sneaks her hands underneath Mila’s sweater and rubs at her hard nipples through her bra. By the time they’re back upstairs, Mila’s mind is on doing whatever she can to get both of them in the shower without Michele noticing.

As she’s locking the front door and Sara’s unpacking their groceries in the kitchen, Michele turns around on the sofa and holds up a DVD case. “You have Singin’ in the Rain,” he says.

The vague approval in his voice is almost enough to make up for the sex she won’t be having this afternoon.

•

They watch musicals for the rest of the day, even though Sara’s affection for them quickly wanes. When Michelle pops in the second DVD of The King and the Skater, Sara pulls the blanket around her and Mila again, just like last night. Unfortunately for Mila, she’s far bolder with her hands this time. She starts by running her fingertips over Mila’s stomach, but soon ventures up to her breasts. Her fingertips circle one nipple, then the other, and pinch through the fabric at the least expected moments. She even manages to get Mila’s bra off without her brother noticing. …Probably.

The first twenty minutes of West Side Story are spent with Sara teasing Mila’s freed nipples. She pinches, strokes, and rubs until Mila’s almost wild with lust. Her jaw is trembling from trying to keep silent, and her muscles ache from trying to keep still. Every so often, she squeezes her thighs tighter just for the barest hint of sensation on her clit, because of course Sara’s not _that_ far gone that she’ll move her hand down there. Every time Mila shifts, though, she can feel the slick gathered between her legs and dreads drawing Michele’s attention to it.

When Bernardo dies, Michele weeps into a tissue, and Sara takes the opportunity to suck on Mila’s earlobe.

It isn’t until Sara bites down that Mila suspects she’s making a point. Namely that Mila was _very, very wrong_ to invite Sara’s brother here.

•

Based on the entire day of teasing and buildup, Mila’s excited and nervous to find out what Sara has in store for her when they close Mila’s bedroom door. Out of deference to Michele sleeping in the other room, Mila tries to keep their kisses as quiet as she can. She even manages to tamp down her moan when Sara grazes a blunt, newly-trimmed fingernail over her clit.

The third time she does it, though, with exactly the same pressure, Mila trembles and whispers, “I’m sorry.”

Sara kisses her navel. “For what, love?” she asks.

“For inviting him.”

The confusion on Sara’s face lasts a brutal few seconds, then it clears. “Why are you apologizing for that?” she asks. She licks her finger absently and sits back on her heels, apparently prepared for a conversation.

Mila pulls herself up to sit with her legs crossed and tries to focus because her very naked girlfriend wants to talk now.

“I thought…” It sounds ridiculous to say it now. ‘I thought you were making moves on me all day to punish me,’ is a strange sort of revenge, and not something Sara would usually do. Still, she’s got nothing else, so she says it.

Sara’s incredulity is emphatic. “ _What?_ ”

“Shh!”

“I wasn’t _punishing_ you! I was—”

“Shh!”

“I was _horny_ ,” Sara hisses. “You made out with me in the lobby and—”

“Yeah, but that wasn’t _in front of your brother!_ ”

“It was under the blanket! Besides, when did we have any other time to be alone today, huh? None! I didn’t realize we’d be with him _the whole trip!_ I don’t think you realize this, Mila, but part of why I wanted to come here was to have _sex_ with my _girlfriend_.”

Mila opens her mouth, but she doesn’t have anything to say in her defense that Sara doesn’t already know. “I just…I wanted to make your brother stop hating me,” she says, folding her arms over her breasts.

Sara moves closer and frames Mila’s face in her hands. “Beautiful, look at me,” she says gently.

Mila does, with effort.

Sara thumbs her cheek. “He doesn’t hate you. He doesn’t hate anyone. He’s always been a lonely boy and he doesn’t make friends easily. He doesn’t understand that when I love another person, it doesn’t mean I love him less.” She kisses Mila’s nose, a more intimate gesture than the playful poke she normally goes with. “Tomorrow, after you get back from training, the two of you should spend some time together. Because I think you were right about this trip.”

Mila’s eyes widen.

Sara smiles. “Can I have sex with my girlfriend now?”

Mila nods, stunned.

It keeps her quiet until Sara presses a vibrator against Mila’s clit while sucking on one nipple and pinching the other, and then Mila has no idea what sounds she might be making.

•

She makes sure to wake up early and escape the apartment before Michele even leaves the guest room.

•

Training doesn’t last as long as she expects, but Yuuri catches her on her way out with a gentle smile.

“How’s the visit going?” he asks. He’s dressed to leave, wearing the new cat hat Georgi gave him and loosely gripping the straps of his backpack. Viktor’s nowhere in sight, which explains why he’s initiating conversation in the first place.

Mila lifts the strap of her sports bag over her chest, wincing a little when it brushes a nipple Sara sucked a little too enthusiastically last night. “It’s going well,” she says. “I’m supposed to take Michele out today. Just the two of us.”

Yuuri’s face clearly expresses for him what kind of idea he thinks that is.

“I know,” Mila says with a sigh. “But it was my idea to invite him here, and Sara asked me to, so…I’m stuck.”

Yuri shoulders by between them with a snort. “Take him to a cliff and kick him off,” he says. “Later, losers.”

“Gold medal!” Mila reminds him.

Yuuri’s too kind to do the same. “Bye, Yura!”

Yuri fires the finger over his shoulder at them both anyway.

Once again, however, he’s given Mila an idea.

•

She doesn’t tell Michele what they’re doing or where they’re going, so of course he spends the entire taxi ride in anxious silence. It’s only now, of course, when it’s just the two of them, that Mila can see him more clearly and read the nervous emotions flitting over his face.

She pays the driver and ushers Michele out onto the sidewalk, and when his eyes fall on the theater, Mila knows she made the right call.

(She cleared it with Sara first, of course. She’s not _that_ confident yet.)

When Michele manages to drag his eyes from the theater, he gives Mila an awed, baffled look. She smiles, shy for the first time in years.

“I thought,” she says, choosing her words carefully, “since you seem to like musicals so much, the Russian Ballet—”

“I’m sorry,” Michele blurts.

Mila stares. “I—what?”

“I’m _sorry_ ,” Michele says, more awkwardly. His English isn’t as strong as Sara’s, as Mila’s; it’s something she’s always intellectually known, but never really had reason to consider until now, faced with his tiny cringes as he forces out words from his second language to his sister’s girlfriend. “For yesterday. And also the day before. And also for…this year.” He takes a breath and glances at the theater, almost as if he believes it can come to life and help him.

Mila decides to do that instead. “Thank you,” she says, “for apologizing. I understand how you feel.”

He doesn’t seem to believe that, but he inclines his head anyway. It means something, but Mila has no idea what.

Feeling a little emboldened, Mila offers him her arm and smiles. “Shall we go in?” she asks.

He stares at her arm, then gives her a calculating look as if he’s trying to decide if she’s going to elaborate measures to humiliate him.

Ultimately, he decides to trust her, and they walk into the theater arm in arm.

•

He cries twice, Mila cries once, and they wind up sharing Michele’s handkerchief. The left side is his, the right hers. By the end, it’s one hundred percent damp and disgusting, and it gives them their first inside joke. When they get back to the apartment and find Sara asleep on the sofa, Michele puts a finger to his lips and holds the handkerchief up as if to ask, “Where do I clean this?”

Mila points to the garbage bin, and the two of them dissolve into silent giggles.

•

On the third day, Mila wakes up feeling like herself for the first time in months. She carried Sara to bed last night, and sometime between falling asleep and waking up, Sara’s managed to twine their legs and nuzzle her face against Mila’s neck. Her hot breath against Mila’s skin is the sweetest sensation Mila can imagine. She watches Sara sleep, treasuring the sight and locking it away for the weeks or months that will separate them next.

Sara’s eyes are closed when her waking smile spreads across her mouth. “Good morning, baby,” she whispers.

Mila kisses her forehead. “I had fun with Michele,” she says. She expected to feel more triumphant; instead, she just feels affectionate. The guy in her guest room isn’t a possessive monster, it turns out. When she turned the flashlight around, he was nothing more intimidating than exactly what Sara said he is: a lonely boy with a dearth of friends.

Sara’s happiness is at once soft and bright. “You’re so precious to me,” she says in Italian. “My beautiful, sweet girl.”

When they leave the bedroom thirty minutes later, they’re surprised to find Michele already dressed and sitting at the kitchen table with his charging phone in hand. He gives Mila a small smile, then a warmer one to Sara.

“I, ah. I wrote to Georgi,” he says. He lifts his phone as if demonstrating how he did this. “He’s going to take me to sightsee today. I think he and Katsuki and Nikiforov have plans for dinner, so maybe I’m invited to that too. I don’t know yet.” He’s fidgeting in his seat, but Mila isn’t sure he can control it.

Beside her, Sara seems on the verge of tears, but she only nods and says, “Okay. Have fun.”

Mila makes Michele an omelet before he leaves, and he thanks her with complete sincerity. The three of them eat slowly, with Michele and Mila recounting the ballet with matching enthusiasm for Sara, who seems more enthralled with their new dynamic than the story they’re using it to tell. Under the table, she holds Mila’s hand and squeezes hard every time Michele gives Mila a tentative smile.

On his way out, Sara tugs Michele into a hug, and even if it goes on much longer than a goodbye normally would, Mila’s just moved to see her girlfriend so happy, and her girlfriend’s brother comfortable enough around her now to show a more vulnerable side of himself.

“See you soon,” Mila says to him at the door.

He shakes her hand once, solemnly, and Mila manages to keep a solemn expression until she shuts the door. She turns to face Sara, the only witness, and mouths _what the fuck was that?_ at Sara, who’s barely containing her laughter. Sara mouths back, _approval?_ with emphatic _I have no idea_ gestures.

•

He’s barely been gone six minutes before Mila shoves Sara into their usual armchair and hungrily strips off Sara’s camisole.

**Author's Note:**

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